How to Go Green: Wine

Ever since the days of Julius Caesar, wine has been big business-last year, California alone sold 554 million gallons at home and abroad. But back when Caesar and his men were toasting their latest military victory they weren't thinking about the ecological effects of that 100-B.C. vintage--because they didn't have to. Their vineyards weren't maintained with the same chemicals and pesticides that most modern wineries use; organic growing just came naturally.

These days, you'll have to look a little harder to find a wine that's not synthetically manipulated in any way, whether by man-made fertilizers, pest deterrents, or chemical-laden bottling processes. But even though they're hard to find, they're out there: more and more winegrowers are producing organic grapes using low-impact and biodynamic viticulture procedures, and upping the sustainability of their properties by controlling erosion, irrigation, and fertilization with the long-term health of the earth--not just their crops--in mind.

Still other vineyards are cutting back on their consumption and packaging-decreasing their wine's carbon footprint-while small, local wineries offer neighborhood customers an energy efficient alternative to vintages shipped from overseas. So whether you're looking for that perfect birthday-party chardonnay or just a merlot for sipping after a busy week, it's easier than ever to green your reds and whites.

Top Green Wine Tips

Start with organic ingredientsThe first step toward making an organic wine is growing organic grapes--which means no pesticides, chemical sprays, or forced growing processes. The root of all of this is the soil, of course, where animal manure and other natural fertilizers take the place of chemicals, and native predators (instead of pesticides) are allowed to defend the plants against mites and disease. Instead of lethal weed-killers, non-vine plants are allowed to grow around the grape plants--but then are trimmed and allowed to rot back into the earth as more fertilizer.

Follow Mother Nature's leadThe practice of biodynamic growing--developed by Dr. Rudolph Steiner in 1924--takes into account not just what you add (or don't add) to the soil and crops, but also the ways in which ecology ties into the movement of the moon, sun, and planets. Demeter USA--the current certification body for biodynamic farms--explains the process as one that lets the farm be as close as possible to its natural wilderness state; there's as little interruption as possible by humans, leading to a carbon footprint that's a fraction the size of other methods. Planting, sowing, spraying, and fertilizing are also done according to the natural rhythms of light and climate.

Respect the landSustainable wineries take steps that go beyond cutting back on paper and recycling glass: their main priority is keeping the land in good enough shape that it can support future generations of viticulture. Along with organic growing procedures, this means fertilizing only when necessary (instead of on a steady schedule); cutting back on erosion by planting cover crops and avoiding tilling; and staying on top of the soil's moisture to avoid over-irrigation.

Pay attention to the processA vineyard may go to a lot of trouble to grow organic grapes, but that doesn't mean the finished product is organic; a winery that adds sulfites as preservatives can't be labeled organic under the USDA regulations. Watch out for labels that claim their product is "sulfite free"; small levels of sulfites are a natural part of the fermentation process and are unavoidable.

Don't assume it's vegan

Vegan wine sounds like a non-issue: it's made from grapes, so as long as you're not pairing that merlot with a steak, you're in the clear. But according to PETA, filtering the wine--to strain out protein, yeast, cloudiness, and other natural by-products--often means using animal-based fining agents, like egg albumen, gelatin, isinglass from fish bladder, and bone marrow. Vegan wines, on the other hand, use carbon, limestone, silica gel, and other non-animal products for equally smooth end results.

Check for certificationTo be really sure you're popping open a bottle that lines up with your ecological morals, scan the label. Note the difference between "organic"--which means the wine is made with organic grapes and no added sulfites--and "made from organically grown grapes" (which means only the former is true). Other certification bodies--like French groups ECOCERT and BIOFRANC--govern wines from other countries. And an increasing number of wineries in Oregon are certified as sustainable by LIVE (Low Impact Viticulture and Enology), which grades growers on their plant protection, monitoring, and biodiversity methods.

Get out your mapWhether you're eyeing up the organic or biodynamic offerings at the wine store, remember: the benefits of eating locally apply to drinking locally, too. Supporting a local vineyard may be nearly impossible for folks who don't live in wine-growing regions, but on the West and East Coast, it might be just as green to choose a cabernet or pinot grigio that came from within 100 miles of your home. Smaller wineries tend to have smaller carbon footprints, too--and just imagine the carbon offsets you'd have to purchase to break even on that South African chardonnay.

Think of the bigger pictureA lot of energy goes into keeping a vineyard up and running--especially if you're looking at a wine from a region not native to grapes. The American Association of Wine Economists publication on wine's carbon footprint (pdf) shows that organic farms produce less greenhouse gas than their eco-harsh counterparts; though not by much, every little bit helps. And for U.S. wine drinkers, there's a sort of Mason-Dixon line that starts at the top of Ohio and runs through Kentucky, Tennessee, Alabama, Mississippi, and Louisiana before ending on the west coast of Texas: west of the line, it's more energy efficient to get your wine from California; east of the division, stick with France (or, even better: New York).

Consider the bottle (or box)Less packaging means less waste on the consumer's end, but also more efficient shipping: Magnums are better than regular or half-sized bottles, since there's a higher wine-to-glass ratio, and shipping wine in bulk to be bottled closer to the distributor cuts the carbon footprint even more. Tetrapaks like those used by French Rabbit are 100 percent recyclable and reduce packaging by 90 percent-and keep wine sheltered from the air long enough to have a shelf life competitive with screw tops. (Next up: an aluminum bottle that turns blue when properly chilled).

Support green wineriesBecoming an organic producer comes with plenty of hard work, both from the costs and time involved. Even wineries that aren't bottling an organic product can green their operations by sterilizing barrels with ozone systems instead of chemicals, reducing water waste during cleaning, using vacuum pumps during bottling, installing solar panels, and converting unusable wine into vinegar. California's Bay Area Green Business Program offers a list of all wineries that are reducing their consumption and energy use.

Green Wine: Getting Techie

Biodynamic agricultureIt sounds more magical than material at first, but when you look a little deeper, biodynamic farming makes a lot of sense: it's organic gone one step further. Winemakers maintaining their lands via biodynamic processes take into account the Earth's rhythms when planting, spraying, harvesting, and making the wine; for example, they'll remove sediment from the wine during a descending moon to take advantage of the gravitational pull for a cleaner product and stronger scent. They also attempt to make each farm self-sustainable and balanced by, for example, letting natural predators take care of insects instead of using pesticide.

SulfitesSulfites have gotten a bad rap in the last few years; they're blamed for causing headaches?and sometime severe reactions?in the approximately 1 percent of the population that's allergic to them, but they're also a naturally-occurring food preservative that shows up in everything from eggs to dried apricots to?yep?grapes. But they've also, for centuries, been added in small quantities to wine to help it keep its color and flavor. The legal limit for sulfites in wine is 350 ppm (parts per million) though most clock in at under 150 ppm; wines without added sulfites often have 5-15 ppm.

USDA Organic certificationWines with sulfites levels of more than 10 ppm are required to be labeled "contains sulfites," while wines with any added sulfites?no matter the quantity?can be qualified only as "made from organic grapes" or "made from organically grown grapes." Preventing the addition of sulfites has some winemakers worried that the uneven quality of wines without preservatives will hurt the industry by giving consumers a skewed idea of how good organic wine can taste; the Organic Wine Company points out that even with 100 ppm of sulfite, wine made with organic processes and grapes is still 99.9 percent organic.